Carrier appeals labor law violation ruling >BY SANDRA GUY, News Editor

Sprint Corp. is appealing a National Labor Relations Board decision requiring that the carrier rehire and pay back wages and benefits to 177 workers whose San Francisco telemarketing office was shut down during a 1994 union organizing drive.

The Dec. 27 ruling upheld an appeal by the Communications Workers of America and reversed earlier decisions in Sprint's favor by an administrative law judge and a federal district court judge.

The case involves Sprint's now-defunct long-distance subsidiary, La Conexion Familiar, which targeted its service at the Latino community (Telephony, Jan. 22, 1996, page 15). The NLRB ruled that Sprint's sudden closing of the LCF telemarketing office one week before a scheduled union election violated federal labor law. The office employed mostly Hispanic women.

The NLRB rejected Sprint's argument that the office had been closed because it was losing money.

Sprint provided an outplacement career center for the office workers, and of the 150 people who used the center, 133 got other jobs, a Sprint spokesman said.

The U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington is expected to decide whether it will hear the appeal within nine to 18 months.

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